


Another Muggle-born

by Entwinedlove



Series: The Great October Challenge 2017 [60]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-21
Updated: 2017-10-21
Packaged: 2019-08-07 05:58:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16402604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Entwinedlove/pseuds/Entwinedlove
Summary: Petunia doesn't want to contemplate that a third generation could be so unfair.





	Another Muggle-born

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Ordinary Writing Levels's 31 Days of Halloween  
> day 21 prompt: magic
> 
> [ ](https://i.imgur.com/xeQwtmz.jpg)

"Mum?" Dudley Dursley said into the phone, his voice was shaky and he sounded almost faint.

"Yes, Duddy-kins?" Petunia answered, worrying about her son.

"Well, you know Daisy had her sixth birthday last month..." he started but stopped to apparently close the door to the room he was in; she could hear the lock click. His voice echoed like was in the toilet.

"What's wrong, Dudley?" Petunia said, foregoing any more nicknames as she perceived her son's distress.

"...what sorts of things did, you know, Harry do when he was a kid?" he finally asked.

Petunia was unsure what he was asking—or implying. "I don't know what you mean, sweetie, he was always misbehaving, causing trouble..."

"No, Mum, I mean really. Not the things you and Dad told other people; what did he _do_?"

She wanted to pretend that her nephew had done nothing unusual, had been only a spoiled, ungrateful brat with a penchant for mischief, but she could tell by the tremor in Dudley's voice that he would not accept her normalising the past or covering it up with the lies she and Vernon had concocted to sleep better at night.

"He turned his teacher's hair blue once," she said, starting stiltedly before picking up speed like she was in a confessional, "he regrew his hair overnight, he shrunk a sweater to doll-size proportions—one of your old sweaters, mind—he sometimes made things fly. The few toys we'd allow him, the blanket he arrived on our doorstep in until it was ripped and I threw it out. He had the uncanny ability to unlock the cupb... cupboard door."

It was with the last line that her guilt and regret started to strangle her and she lost the ability to speak momentarily. After another pause when she'd gathered herself properly, she continued, "He made lights flash and flicker, he blew up your Aunt Marge..."

"I remember that," Dudley said, sounding more at ease now. "Do you have a way to contact him... _them_?"

"Why?" Petunia asked, her tone screechy and uncomfortable. "Please, not my grandbaby, not... no. I refuse to believe it."

"Mum, please," he said, his tone pleading, "She was playing with Hazel and I swear, she made their toys fly. I think she might have—"

Petunia found herself overwhelmed. With thoughts of the owl and the letter that arrived for her sister, of that witch coming to speak with her family about precious Lily and her fancy school, with her own letter to the headmaster and the subsequent mortification to find that Lily and her nasty little friend had read it, her bitterness and hatred for her sister, of learning of her death and being foisted with her son. The torment of having to care for him and the troubles he gave her and Vernon. Having to leave their home because of him. She still put Vernon's heart attack and death at the boy's feet, altogether too ready to blame his health troubles on her nephew despite knowing it was both her and her husband's own fault for his failed health. She couldn't fathom, couldn't begin to possibly imagine it happening a third time: Her and Lily, Dudley and Harry, and now again, Hazel and Daisy.

She hung up the phone before he spoke _that_ word.

"—magic."


End file.
